Monday, August 27, 2012

Lots of things to go over today so I'll try to consolidate them in one post.

1. There's a large storm that is about to hit the gulf coast. Again. I have to laugh at the local news stations. They're all excited and a little crazy. I just don't trust these local weather people. They have about as much hurricane experience as I do. So if you want to keep up with the actual storm try the National Hurricane Center Podcast.

It looks as if after the storm hits land it's going to go right up the middle of the country.

on the same topic, this time from Chuck Todd and his colleagues at MSNBC with First Read:

"Two storms in two weeks… First Akin, now Isaac… Raising the specter of Hurricane Katrina… The revised schedule: The only official activity today is gaveling in the start of the convention at 2:00 pm ET… New WaPo/ABC poll shows the presidential race deadlocked… But Romney acknowledges that the Obama ads have done damage… Obama ties Romney to House GOP… Florida ad spending surpasses $100 million… Ryan stumps in Janesville… And poll shows McCaskill leading Akin."

Countdown to Dem convention: 7 days
Countdown to 1st presidential debate: 37 days
Countdown to VP debate: 45 days
Countdown to 2nd presidential debate: 50 days
Countdown to 3rd presidential debate: 56 days
Countdown to Election Day: 71 days

2. On a personal note I am sending my best thoughts and good energy to my Mom this week. She is undergoing surgery on her spine to correct a chronic pain issue. I am more than a little nervous about this as spinal surgery is about the most serious surgery there is. Honestly, I hate that I'm so far away from Chicago at a time like this but I did offer to come up there and give some moral support but was declined. That's the brilliant thing about my mom. She's a straight shooter and will tell me what she thinks. I love her for it. Here is hoping for the best possibly outcome to her surgery tomorrow. Here's a pic of my Mom and Dad dancing (so cute!) last year in Florida.

On an upbeat note, I am completely excited about attending this years TEDxKC conference at the Kauffman Center this Tuesday night. Here's what the site says:
August 28th 6:00-9:00
HELZBERG HALL

Doors open at 5 p.m.; the event is 6-9 p.m. (reception to follow). Your ticket includes a T-shirt and access to two pre-event parties: TEDxKC at The Guild (1621 Locust St.) at 6 p.m. Aug. 3 and TEDxKC at Hotel Phillips (106 W. 12th St.) at 6 p.m. Aug. 25

In the spirit of ideas worth spreading, TED has created a program called TEDx. TEDx is a program of local, self-organized events that bring people together to share a TED-like experience. Our event is called TEDxKC, where x = independently organized TED event.

At our TEDxKC event, TEDTalks video and live speakers will combine to spark deep discussion and connection in a small group. The TED Conference provides general guidance for the TEDx program, but individual TEDx events, including ours, are self-organized.

Wednesday, August 22, 2012

First of all let us give thanks to TMZ. They are doing a service to humanity. Well you know I couldn't just let this pass by and not record it for history. He is of course the third in line to be King of England. via TMZ

Prince Harry put the crown jewels on display in Vegas this weekend ... getting BARE ASS NAKED during a game of strip billiards with a room full of friends in his VIP suite.

It all went down Friday night during a raging party in a high rollers hotel suite.
We're told Harry, along with a large entourage, went down to the hotel bar and met a bunch of hot chicks ... and invited them up to his VIP suite.

Once in the room, things got WILD ... with the group playing a game of strip pool that quickly escalated into full-on royal nudity.

Some of the partiers snapped photos of the madness. In one photo, a fully nude Harry cups his genitals while a seemingly topless woman stands behind him.

In another photo, a naked Harry is bear-hugging a woman who appears to be completely naked as well.

No word on who the women are ... or if they got Harry's phone number.

A rep for the Royal Family tells us, "We have no comment to make on the photos at this time."

Sunday, August 19, 2012

Recently this song came up on my "All_In_One" playlist and ironically I had never heard it before.I was having a really challenging day and it seemed that I could not be consoled. This has to be one of the most cathartic songs I've ever heard. I love Jeff Buckley, and it took me a while to figure out whether I liked the woman's voice who was singing with him. It turned out that I did like it and even

now listening to it I find that it is so expressive, so intensely emotional it's hard to describe how it hits me. One of the things that a friend told me recently is that one of the characteristics that they really liked about me is that after I've fallen down, I get up immediately and move on with my life. I don't know exactly how I acquired that trait but it has served me well in the past and I believe it serves me well now. Despite a series of recent setbacks I will continue to move on. One of the things that is very interesting to me is to see my history (or at least the last 12 years) on my blog and to see how I've grown and changed but still remain true to myself. One of the fascinating things to me is that, despite events I still retain the core being that is essentially me. I know it sounds odd but if you think about it, there is sometimes a tendency to loose yourself in other people, in other events, in relationships. This happened to me early on in high school with my best friend David. We were so in love with one another (platonic) and so enamored with the other that we slowly, over the course of a couple years, began taking on the traits of the other. I think it's a perfectly natural to do have that happen, but on the other hand I think there's a danger in loosing yourself completely in that kind of a situation.

my eyes are
a baptism
oh i am filth
and sing her
into my thoughts
oh phantom elusive thing oh,

all flowers in time bend towards the sun
i know you say that there's no-one for you
but here is one,
all flowers in time bend towards the sun
i know you say that there's no-one for you
but here is one, here is one... here is one

aah, ooh...
one that can never be known
either all drunk with the world at her feet
or sober with no place to go

all flowers in time bend towards the sun
i know you say that there's no-one for you
but here is one,
all flowers in time bend towards the sun
i know you say that there's no-one for you
but here is one, here is one... here is one

aah, ooh...
we could go (......)
we can travel round
fading farther from me
with your face in my window call

all flowers in time bend towards the sun
i know you say that there's no-one for you
but here is one,
all flowers in time bend towards the sun
i know you say that there's no-one for you
but here is one, here is one... here is one

I recently had the chance to get out of the city and work with a friend of mine on a manual labor job. I quickly jumped at the offer and signed up for the gig. One of the things that I saw as we were driving through Independence, MO was, brace yourself, a confederate flag proudly flying over a private residence. I was completely shocked. After living in Kansas City for 12 going on 13 years I guess I am sheltered from that kind of brazen display. People have demonstrations, and advocate for lots of things that I agree or disagree with but this type of brazen racism is just shocking. I guess it shouldn't be so shocking to me. Living in Chicago with a population of millions upon millions of people you ran into the possibility that there were some things that I really couldn't stand. But Illinois is no different than Missouri, when you get 50 miles outside of Chicago you'll still find major rural areas and let's just say the attitudes that go with it. Still, I found myself just recoiling from the brazen display of hatred. Needless to say after the job there was an offer to find a local watering hole and having a drink which I passed on, got in my truck and got back to the city as quick as possible. Being a gay man in the country just freaks me out. I don't like it. I feel like I have to watch my back, watch my conversations, watch everything like a hawk. I was discussing with my friend that I wasn't interested in going to some local hick-ass bar and giving some hick-ass some opportunity to beat the shit out of me because I have a rainbow flag on my car, or an Obama/Biden sticker. Give me the urban environment, give me tons of traffic, tons of people, DIVERSITY, anytime over the country.

Speaking of Obama/Biden, according to the Kansas City Election Board website, you have until October 10 to register if you want to vote in the general election.

Monday, August 13, 2012

WASHINGTON (AP) For the first time in two decades, a woman has been tapped to moderate a presidential debate.

CNN's Candy Crowley will moderate one of three October debates between President Barack Obama and Republican challenger Mitt Romney, the Commission on Presidential Debates announced Monday. Jim Lehrer of PBS and Bob Schieffer of CBS News will moderate the other two debates.

Lehrer will question the candidates during the first debate on Oct. 3 at the University of Denver, focused on domestic topics.

Crowley's Oct. 16 debate at Hofstra University in Hempstead, N.Y., will use a town hall format, allowing undecided voters selected by the Gallup Organization to directly question the candidates. Foreign and domestic policy questions will both be fair game.

Another female journalist, Martha Raddatz of ABC News, will moderate an Oct. 11 debate at Centre College in Danville, Ky., between Vice President Joe Biden and Republican Rep. Paul Ryan of Wisconsin.

The debate season will draw to a close on Oct. 22 with a foreign policy-focused debate moderated by Schieffer at Lynn University in Boca Raton, Fla., a crucial swing state.

All the debates are scheduled for 9 p.m. EST. The commission said it will also launch an Internet-based initiative to educate voters before the debates about the issues that are likely to come up.

"We're pleased with the selection of the moderators by the debate commission, and look forward to vigorous and substantive debates this fall," said Obama campaign manager Jim Messina.

Pointing out that the first debate will take place less than 10 miles from the sites of both the Aurora, Colo., shootings last month and the 1999 Columbine attacks, the Brady Campaign to Prevent Gun Violence urged Lehrer on Monday to ask Romney and Obama during the debate for their plans to prevent gun deaths.

When Crowley takes the stage in Hempstead, it will be the first time a woman has moderated a presidential debate since Carole Simpson of ABC News, who refereed a 1992 debate between President George H.W. Bush, Democrat Bill Clinton and Ross Perot.

Crowley's selection came after three teenage girls from Montclair, N.J., organized an online petition drive to persuade the commission to pick a woman. More than 122,000 signatures were on the petition when the moderators were announced Monday.

"Women and men will never be truly equal in our country until they're one and the same in positions of power and both visible in politics," the girls wrote, noting that women will not be represented on either presidential ticket this year.

Backing up the call for a female moderator were Simpson, numerous newspaper editorials and House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., who took to Twitter on Monday to congratulate Crowley.

First, the takeaway superlative for the landing: It “will be the most complex and hair-raising in planetary history.” And for the mission? It is, writes Kaufman, “the most ambitious, the most costly ($2.5 billion) and the most high-stakes mission ever to another planet.”

Other superlatives include the fact that Curiosity is the largest and heaviest human-made object to land on Mars, a critical step if humans are ever to visit the planet. Curiosity is also the first rover to search for the building blocks of life on the Red Planet — the first since the Viking Missions of the ’70s.

As you’ve probably gleaned by now, for NASA followers and fans, to say nothing of the casual observer, the mission is a must-see event. You may be thinking, “That’s great, but where can I watch it?”

NASA’s coverage of the event is scheduled to begin at 11:30 p.m. Sunday night and go until 4 a.m. Monday morning. The landing itself is scheduled for 1:31 a.m. Monday. Unlike the hour-by-hour video coverage of SpaceX’s historic docking with the international space station, don’t expect gorgeous panorama shots of the planet surface immediately after landing. Curiosity will not feed back video as it goes through its “seven minutes of terror” landing sequence. Instead, NASA’s live coverage will center around non-video telemetry. The first images to reach Earth will be low-resolution black and white images after the rover has landed. The high-resolution, color images are expected to be beamed back 48 hours later, after the main mast deploys.

Members of the Mars Science Laboratory/Curiosity team, which includes rover drivers and scientists, test out an engineering model of its next generation Mars rover, dubbed "Curiosity," n the desert near Baker, Calif., on May 10, 2012. (Gene Blevins - Reuters)

Patience may be the name of the game when it comes to photos and video, but it’s not for social media, on which NASA is very active. The agency’s Twitter account has over 2.5 million followers. And the Curiosity landing has its own twitter account, @MarsCuriosity, hashtag, #MSL and Facebook page. NASA also has a number of live-streaming channels on U Stream. For those looking for breaking news, NASA plans to broadcast news of the landing across platforms, with watch parties happening at a number of NASA locations. If you can’t make it to any of those and you live in New York, however, NASA’s live coverage will be broadcast on the Toshiba screen on the main Jumbotron in Times Square.

Yes, folks, this is that big of a deal.

Of all the coverage of Curiosity, however, my favorite outline comes from NASA lead scientist John Grunsfeld during an Aug. 1 interview on Comedy Central’s The Colbert Report. Colbert’s joke that Curiosity’s 14-minute communication delay is shorter than NBC’s tape-delayed Olympics coverage aside, the interview is a nice summation of what to expect from Curiosity.

During the interview, Grunsfeld walks through the “seven minutes of terror” and makes a “bold prediction,” saying, “the Curiosity rover is going to discover nothing on Mars. ... It’s not going to discover a thing.” But, continued Grunsfeld, “people on Earth, the scientists on Earth are going to discover all kinds of incredible things. We’re just going to love it. It’s going to be two years of amazing science.”

And those two years all start Sunday night and hinge on seven critical minutes.

Thursday, August 2, 2012

Behind the Lines for Thursday, Aug. 2, 2012 — 3 P.M.
By David C. Morrison, Special to Congressional Quarterly

In This Issue: A separate peace: “Insistent, gnawing buzz” emanating at all hours from the FBI’s North Virginia Terrorist Screening Center soon to be stifled, GSA pledges . . . Confiscating the jack boots: “Let’s give every DHS officer a gun empty of ammunition and one shiny bullet,” editorial advises . . . Today’s access of angst: “Opportunities for terrorists to acquire WMDs will increase over the coming decade.” These and other stories lead today’s homeland security coverage.
---------------------------------

The insistent, gnawing buzz that emanates at all hours from the FBI’s North Virginia Terrorist Screening Center should be significantly reduced by mid-August and perhaps eliminated altogether by sometime next spring, The Washington Post’s Tom Jackman hears the General Services Administration informing Congress. “Over 10 years after the Sept. 11, 2001 terror attacks and the FBI's computers are finally working,” ABC News’s Jason Ryan reports.

Feds: The number of worldwide terror attacks fell to 10,283 last year from 11,641 in 2010, the lowest since 2005, State reports, pegging the drop in part to the May 2011 assassination of Osama bin Laden, ABC News’s Dana Hughes relates — as Reuters’ David Lerman sees U.S. counterterrorists focused increasingly not on Afghanistan or Pakistan but rather “a broad swath of northern Africa from Somalia through Chad, Niger and Mali to Mauritania and south into Nigeria. The U.S. Embassy and part of central Oslo were evacuated this week when a practice explosive was mistakenly left beneath a vehicle entering the compound, Bloomberg’s Mikael Holter reports.

Homies: Pia Carusone, who came to notice as chief of staff to ex-Rep. Gabrielle Giffords, D-Ariz., critically wounded in a 2001 mass shooting, has been named DHS’ No. 2 for Public Affairs, The Tucson Weekly’s Jim Nintzel notifies. Janet Napolitano, meantime, “told Congress last week that terrorists intending to harm the American people enter the U.S. from Mexico ‘from time to time,’” Cybercast News Service’s Edwin Mora makes portentous. “Let’s give every DHS officer a gun empty of ammunition and one shiny bullet. The DHS officer can keep the bullet in his pocket in case he ever needs it,” a Tacoma (Wash.) Standard-Examiner editorial advises, remarking on much-decried agency weaponry buys.

State and local: Officials from New York State’s Erie and Niagara counties urged House homelanders to restore DHS grants that have aided their communities in the past, The Buffalo News notes. “Since well before the 9/11 terrorist attacks that so heightened security awareness, Indianapolis has trained hundreds of cameras on its citizens — and these days is watching even closer,” The Indianapolis Star surveys. “Somali gangs are unique in that they are not necessarily based on the narcotics trade, as are other traditional gangs,” but there is an international terrorism tie, Cybercast News Service hears the Hennepin County (Minn.) Sheriff testifying. Some 9,000 military and civilian personnel are in southern Indiana for a field exercise simulating response to a domestic terror attack, The Associated Press spotlights.

WMD Watch: The Bayonne Fire Department has unveiled a largely DHS-funded “WMD rescue vessel” as the latest addition to its fleet, The Jersey Journal relates. Opportunities for terrorists to acquire WMDs will increase over the coming decade, The Australian hears Canberra’s chief spy warning in an unusual public address — as States worry that terror groups could use the Philippines’ porous southern border to transport WMDs. “The worst case of letting even relatively small amounts of military-grade chemical weapons get into the wrong hands is suggested by the 1995 Tokyo subway nerve gas attacks,” The RAND Blog assesses, referencing Syria’s worrisome arsenal. Under the Megaports Initiative, U.S. radiation detectors have been installed at four ports through which 92 percent of Mexico’s containerized cargo passes, Homeland Security News Wire relates.

Ivory (Watch) Towers: This past school year, Saudi Arabia sent 66,000 students to U.S. universities, four times the number before 9/11 prompted tough restrictions on Arab students, The Wall Street Journal relates. History offers a warning, but no clear pattern on the true risk of terrorism at the Olympic Games, a new report from U. Maryland’s National Consortium for the Study of Terrorism and Responses to Terrorism concludes, Global Alternative Agenda relays. Conventional wisdom says terrorism must be fought, but research by a pair of academic researchers suggests that conciliatory tactics are more effective than punishment, U.S. News notes. “It's been 10 years since Palestinian Authority terrorists murdered students and staff at Hebrew University's Mount Scopus campus, during the 2002 second Intifada,” Arutz Sheva commemorates.

Close air support: Two alert Miami International screeners prevented kidnappers from bundling a beaten woman aboard a Gotham-bound jet, NBC 6 News notes — as the Express-News sees a bomb threat clearing San Antonio International after a call alleged explosives had been left in three parked cars. An Air Canada passenger found a sewing needle in a catered sandwich during a flight Monday, CNN says. SecurityPoint Media’s rather meretriciously announced inauguration of security bins with ads at D.C. airports brings “nothing in terms of security beyond adding more eyeballs for advertisers,” InTheCapital inveighs. The Australian Federal Police have launched a new national airport security campaign called “Airport Watch,” modeled on neighborhood watches, (the Down Under) ABC News notes — while The New Zealand Herald has Christchurch Airport failing to meet bio-security compliance standards.

Troubled waters: Two of the people in charge of securing the Port Everglades Seaport and the Fort Lauderdale Airport aren't even licensed Florida security guards, the New Times sees a county inspector general report finding — as The South Florida Sun-Sentinel reminds that port security had recently been taken away from Broward Sheriff’s deputies and privatized to Allied Barton. New Haven officials are helming an effort to link security at Connecticut's three deep-water ports with a single video-monitoring system, The New Haven Register reports. “An important element of every port is the security detachment that provides for a secure working environment and compliance with Coast Guard regulations,” Security Management maintains. The president of Nanaimo's Port Authority dismisses a report saying Canadian ports “have slightly less stringent security rules than U.S. ports,” The Nanaimo Daily News notes.

Courts and rights: A federal judge has moved the trial date of a man charged with plotting terror attacks in Tampa to next April or perhaps May, The Tampa Bay Times tells. In a symbolic judgment addressing a suit targeting al Qaeda and Iran for complicity in the 9/11 attacks, a judge has awarded $6 billion to 110 survivors and the estates of 47 victims, including United Airlines Flight 175’s pilot, The New York Daily News relates. A former House staffer suspected of being a source for The New York Times’s disclosure of warrantless wiretapping is suing for return of computers, electronic devices and papers seized in 2007, Politico reports.

Over there: The pregnant wife of a U.K. Muslim convert accused of training for terror in Pakistan has been charged with withholding info from authorities, The Daily Telegraph tells — while The Daily Mirror sees radical imam Abu Qutada, who is fighting deportation to Jordan, losing a bid for bail from high-security Long Lartin Prison. The Taliban-tied Haqqani network “poses the most ominous threat to the fragile American-Pakistani relationship,” The New York Times leads — while Bloomberg hears the Pentagon’s Leon Panetta stating that Egypt’s leaders have agreed to counterterror cooperation and bear a special responsibility to secure the Sinai peninsula. Police in Kampala have released a photo of a “notorious terrorist” from Somalia “feared to have entered the country with plans of hitting Ugandans,” Shabelle Media Network notes.

Over here: “While he wages a culture war on Christians, the president tells Americans not to worry about global Islam,” The American Spectator assails — while a CNN commentator highlights a Pew poll showing one in six Americans still convinced that Barack Obama is a you-know-what, and The Daily Caller jabs the Obama campaign for not retailing merch directed at Muslim supporters. Rep. Michelle Bachmann’s re-election campaign says it raised more than $1 million in July, the same month she was roundly rebuked for alleging Muslim Brotherhood infiltration of the government, The Huffington Post reports — as The St. Michael Patch hears the Minnesota Republican saying she hopes to work on welfare fraud with Rep. Keith Ellison, D-Mich., an outspoken Muslim, whom, The Fridley Patch reports, returns the collegial sentiment.

Holy Wars: A British nun previously fined $300-plus for shouting at women in burkhas “You are probably terrorists,” has been convicted of mailing the prototypical “white powder” to allegedly “devil worshipping” politicians, The Birmingham Mail mentions. Syrians say their uprising is becoming more radicalized, with homegrown jihadists as well as al Qaeda fighters demanding a say in the resistance, the Times updates. “What very few people know is that European companies and scientists gave Iran, Syria, Libya and Iraq the material to attempt to kill the Jews, again,” Arutz Sheva arraigns, charging Euro-firms with having supplied chemical weapon components. “Westerners imagine a stark contrast between supposedly violent Muslims on the one hand and pacifist Buddhists on the other,” an American Muslim contributor comments, pointing gleefully to Religion Dispatches’ “Monks With Guns: Discovering Buddhist Violence.”

Game Face: “As the world settles down to watch the London Olympics, the British Olympic Committee and Downing Street are staring in horror at tens of thousands of empty seats at the various sporting venues,” The Spoof spoofs. “Many sports fans have complained at the lack of availability of affordable seats, and corporate sponsors appear not to have utilized their ticket allocations, resulting in crowd numbers not seen since the Dutch won the last World Crocheting Championship in 1931. In response, the British government has extracted its forces from all overseas military operations and has suspended its membership in NATO until after the Closing Ceremony. Troops returned from Afghanistan, the Falkland Islands, Gibraltar, various African countries, Cyprus and Germany have been deployed, in plain clothes, to the various Olympic venues, in an effort to give the appearance that there is interest in the Games. The Sports Minister was unavailable for comment. A ministerial aide told us he was in training for his own personal high jump event, which is likely to take place, quietly, when the Games are over.”
Source: CQ Homeland Security

If you haven't registered, for the love of everything sacred and holy REGISTER!

The ballot summary for Amendment 2 sounds innocent enough. But, dig a little deeper and you'll find disturbing provisions that actually threaten religious liberties. Take this quiz to see if you can spot the truths from the lies.

Unable to go to the polls on Tuesday, Aug. 7? Request an absentee ballot, but hurry because your local election authority must receive your mailed request by 5 p.m., on Aug. 1.

Help us stand up for religious freedom. Vote NO on Amendment 2!

Test Your Knowledge

True or False:

1.) Missourians already have the right to pray in public schools, work places and government settings.

TRUE: The Missouri Constitution already offers this protection. Amendment 2 is unnecessary and adds vague language that is sure to invite litigation that will cost taxpayers dearly.

2.) Amendment 2 is right in saying that religious speech should be treated like all other speech.

FALSE: If passed, this provision could violate the U.S Constitution and create great confusion. Religious speech has unique limits. For example, public school teachers can't pass out Bibles in their classroom for religious purposes. Blurring that distinction could lead to religious discrimination.

3.) Amendment 2 may compromise the education of students in our state.

TRUE: Amendment 2 allows students to opt out of assignments and educational presentations with which they disagree, which potentially leads to more complicated, expensive litigation.

4.) Amendment 2 will increase protection of religious liberties for all Missouri citizens.

FALSE: This amendment doesn't broaden anyone's liberties. It actually removes religious protection for one class of citizens — prisoners — who may lose their ability to practice their faith and receive religious materials while incarcerated.

5.) Missouri's constitutional protection of religious liberties has been unchanged since 1820, one year before Missouri became a state.